It wasn't exactly easy going. He kept checking behind himself all the way down the street until he turned the corner. He kept moving, keeping an eye out on his surroundings. He was more worried that strangers would see him and judge him for what he was doing. He shouldn't care, he really shouldn't, but he couldn't help it. There was a part of him that hated himself for running away like this.

But then he got a knot in his stomach, his chest tightened at the thought that maybe he'd been manipulated by Steve and then he felt the anger bubble up again. It was a vicious cycle and at this point he was really sick of thinking.

A few streets later, he realized he didn't know where he was going. Or even where he was. He looked around himself, turning from side to side, looking for street signs or something to indicate he might have driven by here before but it distracted him and it was too late to hide when a familiar silver car could be seen coming around a bend in the street.

He froze. It was moving slowly. Whoever was at the wheel (most likely the person who was always at the wheel) was too busy looking about himself to concentrate on the road in front, but Danny knew the exact moment he'd been spotted, because the car practically leapt forward, the accelerator pressed down, roaring the car to life.

In another spectacularly stupid moment, Danny did the first thing he could think of: he bolted. It was stupid because he was running down a sidewalk in his bare feet, his balance off because of his hand position. The car was catching up with ease considering how fast it could really go. When Danny realized this, he stopped dead in his tracks and the car screeched to a halt further in front of him.

But as much as he was going on very little thought, he wasn't as dumb as it seemed, because he darted down a dirt path between two houses. Now they'd both be on foot, because there was no way the car could follow down what seemed to be a worn bike path. It was constricting on both sides: a straight shoot down between garages and fences, but the loose stones and dirt made it so Danny had to concentrate so as not to hurt himself or trip.

He hadn't looked behind, but he'd heard the yells of his name and knew Steve was gaining on him. He stopped, turned, and just at the last minute plastered himself to a wall, dodging out of the way of a flying tackle he'd only ever seen Steve use on perps.

Steve let out a growl as he landed on his stomach. His hands braced against the ground, he whipped his head in Danny's direction, eyes narrowing as he looked up at him.

"Wait, please…" Danny said, hands out placatingly, restlessly moving his weight from one leg to another. "Okay? Just please, don't do whatever it is you're thinking."

"What I'm thinking is that my husband ran out on me on our wedding day! What the hell, Danny?! The runaway bride act?!" Steve pushed up to his knees, his own once-clean suit pants and shirt now similarly stained with dirt.

"I am NOT Julia Roberts here, okay? And can I just say that movie was rife with inaccuracies. RIFE."

"What?" Steve asked, incredulous as to the turn in the conversation.

"She made it look so easy to get out of these things!" Danny held his hands up, showing his bindings. He'd tried, he had. He'd twisted his wrists every which way but he couldn't get to the clasp. All he'd done was chafe them, his skin reddening in contrast to the shining gold of the cuffs where they were flush against him.

Steve took a breath as he shuffled around on his knees to face Danny better. He seemed calmer as he spoke, but it was masking tension. "Danny. Please. Will you go get in the car. People are waiting."

"Oh yeah, sure, no problem, Steve, because I shimmied down a fucking tree for fun to kill some time, I didn't realize it had gotten so late."

"Oh my God, Danny. Can we argue about all the little details later? The Governor is in our back yard right now. Chin and Kamekona are stalling for us but I don't know how long they can hold out."

"Details? You think I'm upset over details?"

Steve reached out for Danny's hands but he jerked them back before he could touch him, taking a small step away. "Danny, I am trying here, I really am. I thought I'd put together something amazing, okay? People came out to support us, I got everything expedited, I've been on the phone with the bank and the lawyers… I told you I'd take care of everything and I have. Last night, on the couch, everything was fine. Happy. Ecstatic, even. What could possibly change overnight? I thought you were on board with this."

Danny scrubbed his hands over his face. He tilted his head from side to side a couple of times as he waged an internal war, remembering just how fine he'd been with things when he'd also thought that a certain Mister Jack Daniels deserved a medal and possibly Australia for creating his bourbon.

"We got carried away. There were fantasy scenarios and a severe desire to screw the system discussed and…" Danny's shoulders deflated. "And you told me you loved me. You actually said all the right things, and that floored me." He lowered himself closer to Steve, cupping his face as best he could and smiled faintly. "You made me feel good about myself and the shit that's happened in my life. You actually made me think we could fix things."

Steve's hands lightly curled around Danny's wrists, over the binds. "And all that disappeared when you woke up?"

"No, but reality sunk in. There's no quick fixes in life, no matter how much you think your Navy SEAL training has prepared you for everything and I thought we were… I dunno what I thought we were doing."

"We were doing exactly what we wanted," Steve's adamant voice was punctuated with a tightening of his hands on Danny.

"In our own little fantasy world, maybe. But what you spun turned out to be a lot more real than I expected. When you phoned the Governor last night, I thought you were speaking to a dial tone. Hell, I didn't even think we were going to file the papers at all. Do you know how many times we put everything down on paper and then changed things before Rachel and I got married? We wanted to please her father, but at the same time, we wanted our marriage to be about us and not a contract. It was a fine line and it took us a good month to lock it down before finally, finally, we took the papers to city hall. And in one night, one night, you get us married."

"We still need to have the ceremony."

Danny dropped his hands, shaking off Steve's grip. "Like that bit even matters, it's just pageantry and an excuse to rack up a credit card bill. The legal documents are already through! They've been signed, witnessed, notarized, whatever."

"I still don't see the problem." Steve frowned at the withering look he got in response. Danny felt he'd explained himself just fine. One night was not acceptable for compromise. "Hear me out, Danny. You say we spun a fantasy that you were enjoying. So I made it real. Isn't that a good thing? Isn't that a great thing? It's not like we left anything out, we spent ages considering everything, making sure we put in all we needed to and you said it yourself, it's a great deal. So it didn't take us weeks to figure it out, so what? Not every marriage has to take an army of lawyers to hash out the details and take our money. In fact, isn't it better that we did it like we did? It was fast, painless, it shows we're on the same page. It shows how perfect we are together."

"Alcohol, Steve. The bourbon made us a lot more agreeable."

"No, no no no. If you, if we didn't want it as it is, we wouldn't have signed. Even drunk, you still have a level enough head for this kind of thing, I know you do." To Danny's mind, Steve was grasping at straws as he placed his hands on Danny's shoulders, trying to convince him. It felt like he would say anything to try and get Danny back on board, but he'd clearly convinced himself of his own arguments, too. It made it difficult to argue with him, when he convinced himself of what he wanted to hear. There was seldom an opportunity to talk Steve out of things. It never worked.

"Steve-" Danny began.

"No," he was cut off. "Every argument you present, I'm just going to counter it. I know you. Maybe better than you know yourself at times and right now, you're scared of the change in your life, you're not scared of me, or of marriage to me. That's why I know we're doing the right thing."

"Maybe you're right. But it means I'm not ready." Danny's eyes took on a pleading edge again and he lifted his hands between them. "Please take these off."

"No," Steve shook his head.

"Steve-"

"NO!" Steve growled, raising his voice as he pushed to his feet, pacing away then turning back, the veins in his neck straining with anger. He took two large steps back to Danny and forced him to his feet, pulling on his elbows and holding steady. "Stop this, stop making excuses. Stop telling me you don't want it when I know you do."

Steve shook Danny, making him lurch forward with the force. "Get your hands off me!"

"Get in the damn car!"

"Are you going to drag me there, huh? Pull me by my hair?"

"IF I HAVE TO!"

Danny twisted his body, loosening Steve's hold on his elbow enough so he could shove a shoulder against him, trying to make him back off, but it just made Steve yank his other arm back and around so that he could grip him under his arm pits and begin to move him back along the track towards the street.

Danny dug his heels in. "No. Steve. Ste- wha… Steven!"

He could do very little with his hands, his back was to Steve, his shoulders pressed to his chest as Steve held tight. He struggled against him as Steve got the upper hand and marched him as best he could back the way they'd come. Eventually he kicked out, his foot impacting with Steve's knee making him buckle and Danny finally was able to twist further and he brought his fists up as one to get a good right hook in against Steve's jaw.

Everything slowed as he watched Steve recover from the blow, his hand going to his jaw to check the damage but he didn't reach out for Danny again.

As they stood there, breathing heavily, their eyes met in disbelief.